going deeper

Briefing for a descent into Thrax

January 1, 2011

Tomorrow, my group and I will have our 23rd, no 22nd, no 17th, no 25th session. By which I mean, we will have the next session in our line of sessions stretching back to May ’09, and I really wish I had kept a little better track of these things because, although it surely doesn’t matter to anyone, least of all me (in any real sense), I wish I could point to a real, definite number and say “See! 23 sessions! So!” But I can’t. Instead, I will do what any good DM does and choose something kind of arbitrarily and then commit.
Tomorrow, my group and I will have our 22nd session. Yes, 22 sessions of dungeon delving the Old Schoole Way, 22 sessions of blood, routs and slaughter, 22 sessions of houserules tried and backpedaled on, 22 sessions of “Oh, please let them open this door… please, please, please.” And today I am preparing.

Here is what “preparing” means to me: Staring into space, picturing how it might go; Practicing NPC voices (because when you have a primary antagonist with a Count Floyd accent, you can’t not practice it every chance you get); and, of course, toying with the idea of actually stat-ing up The Villain, but somehow finding better things to do. The single most wonderful thing about the Old School Way is that I’m pretty sure I could stop all preparation right now and still have a perfectly enjoyable game where my players don’t suspect that I’m shirked DM-duties. But today is a “preparing is half the fun” kind of day, so I’m going to go ahead and whip up that Villain and jot down a few notes about things that have changed in the dungeon since their last adventure. Today, I’ll enjoy it, but I’m happy to have the option about how much energy to expend on it.

Oh, I gave up the illusion of having good accents a long time ago. Now I just revel in the terribleness. Yet another thing I’m digging about the old school approach is that there’s no particular reason to take things too seriously and yet there are still moments of high drama. A future post, perhaps.